


Them's the Breaks

by St_Salieri



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Season/Series 05
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-25
Updated: 2011-09-25
Packaged: 2017-11-25 10:14:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/637808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/St_Salieri/pseuds/St_Salieri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Angel hates relying on anyone - especially when that anyone is Spike.  Takes place during late S5 (AtS).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Them's the Breaks

 

The worst thing about the sewers isn't the dampness, or the dark, or even the smell. After years in a hell dimension, he can handle the discomfort. Hell, he doesn't even need to breathe. He's taken - and doled out - far worse in his time.

The splashing noises are coming closer now, the sounds of heavy booted feet audible above the chittering of rats. Angel pulls himself deeper into the corner so he's mostly out of the wet, grunting in pain as the movement jars his leg. The footsteps are approaching, closer and closer every second, and if he holds his breath and stays very still maybe they'll pass him by and he'll be safe.

"Angel? You back here? Oh - there you are. What in the bloody hell are you doing crammed into that corner?"

The worst thing about the sewers isn't the aesthetics. It's the goddamn _company_.

"Spike." The name is hissed out through clenched teeth, a grunt of pain that is more than half curse. It's usually how he says the name these days, though, so Spike should be used to it.

Spike drops the sword he's holding and the greenish guts that coat it bleed away in the water. Angel winces at the clatter.

"If you scratched that, I'm docking your pay."

Spike snorts. "You don't pay me. Not that you know of, that is." Angel opens his mouth to ask, but decides that he's better off not knowing. Chances are it involves Harmony and is almost certainly illegal. "Oh, and I finished off that last demon for you," Spike continues. "You're welcome, by the way."

"Funny, I don't remember thanking you." The last word comes out as a gasp. His leg is throbbing unbearably, and he winces at the idea that he let Spike see him in pain.

"Yeah, imagine my surprise," Spike mutters, then frowns. "Hey, how badly are you hurt, anyway?"

"I'm fine."

He's grasping his own thigh now, fingers digging viciously into the muscle to try to lessen the ache. He can feel the trickle of blood dripping from his calf, and the tickle is almost worse than the pain itself. Something is surely broken, but he hasn't had the chance to do an inspection yet. And he'd get right on that if Spike would only _go away_.

"Yeah, you look it."

Spike kneels in front of him and grabs the hem of his right pant leg, tearing it upwards in a sudden jerk.

"Ow! Spike, you bastard, do you know how much those pants cost?"

"Take it out of my non-existent salary," Spike says, eyes fixed on the exposed leg. And now that Angel can see it...yeah, the _ow_ factor is overwhelming the aggravation over the ruined pants or the indignity of Spike seeing him like this.

It's been a long time since he's been subject to a compound fracture. The skin of his calf is torn, blood pooling on the dirty ground beneath. If he squints, he can make out the white of the exposed bone. Angel decides not to squint.

"Are you happy now?" he grits out. "Just...go away, will you? I can take care of it on my own."

Spike snorts again. Angel notices absently that Spike tends to do that a lot when he and Angel are in a room together.

"Fine," Spike says shortly. "You can sit there and mope in your damp trousers and hope that no curious rats come by. At the rate you're losing blood, it should only take, oh, about a week to heal."

Unfortunately, Spike is right - and he knows it, which is worse. This kind of injury is hardly fatal for a vampire, but it's not the sort of thing that will heal in an afternoon either.

Angel runs through the options in his head. If he has to send Spike back for help, who would be the least humiliating option? Lorne is out town at the moment, Gunn has been MIA for the last few days, and Wes...well, he's been spending so much time skulking around Illyria that it would probably take a nuclear strike to get his attention. There's Harmony...but he might as well take out an interoffice memo to the entire damn building saying, _Re: Everyone. Your CEO has recently had his testicles removed._

He doesn't put it past Spike to send one out anyway, just on general principles.

Which leaves Spike. Who, in the meantime, has been fondling Angel's broken leg.

"Hey! Get away from that! It's already broken enough."

Spike has an evil glint in his eye, and Angel has over a century of experience to know that that look means absolutely nothing good.

"Aw, what's the matter, baby?" Spike purrs. "Don't you like me on my knees in front of you?"

No. _No._ "No!" Okay, that might have been too vehement. Spike purses his lips thoughtfully.

"Are you sure? I remember one time in Bern around, oh, the turn of the century. We were all staying at this little chalet, and Darla took Dru out. A little shopping, a little slaughter. You know how women are. And you and I were left to our own devices...."

And the devil of it is that Angel _does_ remember, very well. The smell of the cedar, the crackle of the hearth fire, the way Spike's mouth hung open so prettily when Angel fisted his hands in Spike's hair....

"Sorry, don't remember. It must not have been that memorable," Angel says stiffly.

And then suddenly Spike is there, leaning in way too close, his eyes drooping to half-mast. Angel can feel his gaze dropping south to that mouth when....

"OW! Holy _shit_ , Spike! What the hell?"

Spike leans back with a smile of satisfaction, and Angel follows his gaze down to his own right leg. It still aches, but after the excruciating wrench Spike just gave it the pain has decreased dramatically. The relief is almost orgasmic. Spike picks up a short length of rebar lying nearby and sets it under Angel's calf, using pieces of the ruined pair of pants to tie it to the leg.

"Field medicine is eighty percent distraction," Spike says briskly. "And you're very easy to distract, might I say. Not been getting any recently, have you?"

Angel growls low in his throat, but he can't bring himself to be too upset. The re-set leg looks much better than it did, and this way it will have a greater chance of healing straight.

"Thanks," he says grudgingly. He half expects Spike to start crowing about it, maybe try to blackmail him for a new car or something in exchange for discretion, but Spike just shrugs.

"Eh. Can't let our fearless leader go around with a limp, can we? Besides, the faster you heal up the sooner we can get out of here. There's got to be six sets of ladders between here and the surface, and I'm not hauling your sorry carcass up them."

"Good. Well...okay. I guess that means you'll be going now?"

He tries to sound as ungracious as possible - he has an image to maintain, after all - but he suddenly realizes that he's not as anxious for Spike to disappear as he usually is. There's something almost comforting about his presence.

Which is probably a sign that he's going into shock or something.

Spike settles himself down on a dry slab of concrete and props his legs out in front of him, digging in his pocket for a cigarette and lighter. "Nah," he says easily. "I've got nothing better to do. Besides, Wolfram & Hart has taken a turn for the downright depressing these days. Do you see the way everyone goes around the place, as if they're waiting for the axe to fall?"

And yes, Angel has noticed it, but he doesn't want to think about it too closely yet. He can't afford to reveal his hand too early, although a small part of him almost wants to lay his plans out for Spike to get his opinion. Spike's plans usually fall to hell quickly, but he does have a knack for pointing out when Angel has been overthinking things.

"Where did you learn that, anyway?" he asks as a topic-changer. "The field medicine."

Spike blows out a breath and watches the smoke curl its way up to the ceiling of the tunnel. "Sunnydale," he says shortly. "You know what they're like, humans. Always getting hurt."

Angel has a sudden memory of evenings spent patrolling with Buffy, tending each other's wounds before collapsing into his bed for a night of unresolved sexual tension. He wonders if Spike has similar memories - except with the tension resolved - and feels his stomach twist into a knot. The thought still hurts, like poking at a bruise, but he doesn't feel the same pain and rage he would have felt a year ago at the thought of Spike and Buffy together. He wonders if that means he's growing up - or if he's growing away from her. Neither thought is a happy one.

"I don't want to know," he says shortly.

"Good. I'm not telling you."

"Fine."

"Fine!"

They sit in silence for a long moment, and Angel wonders how much time has passed. The night must be more than half over by now, not that he can tell by the unchanging artificial illumination of the Los Angeles underground. Everything is quiet apart from the drip of the water, which means that they must have gotten the entire nest of demons. And that's satisfying, even if nothing else is.

"You're looking a little grey around the edges there, Angel. When's the last time you ate?"

Spike is looking at him curiously now, and Angel leans his head back against the wall and closes his eyes and tries to think. His brain is feeling fuzzier than usual. He must have lost more blood that he thought.

"I don't know. Last night? I had meetings all day today, and Harmony spilled my lunch on the carpet when she tripped over those ridiculous shoes of hers. Remind me to fire her when I get back."

He can hear Spike sigh heavily, then the rustle of his coat as he moves. Angel jolts in surprise when Spike settles down next to him.

"Oh relax, would you?" Spike eases off his coat and takes a deep breath as if bracing himself for something. And then, to Angel's utter astonishment, he offers Angel his own arm. Angel gapes at it for too long to be polite.

"What? No! I don't need your blood, Spike!"

Spike just rolls his eyes. "You need blood, period, or it's going to take you forever to heal well enough to walk. And I'm _not_ catching any rats for you, so that's right out."

Angel feels himself licking his lips without meaning to. His stomach growls. Damn Spike and his mention of food, because he suddenly realizes that he _is_ ravenously hungry. It's something he hasn't had for untold years - the blood of family. The thought is tempting, so tempting that he shifts into his true face in a subconscious recognition of hunger.

Spike would never let him live this down if he said yes, but somehow that doesn't bother him as much as it usually would. Still, the tattered remains of his pride scream for him to say no. He has a sudden memory of taunting Spike about the fucked-up codependence that was his relationship with Drusilla. Angel had called him "nursemaid", once brought him home a little frilly cap and apron and cackled while Spike tore it to pieces. It would be so easy to fall back on that memory and poke holes in Spike's sudden kindness until they're both back at their usual level of eye-rolling mutual exasperation.

But he's not the same vampire he was all those years ago. And neither, he's starting to realize, is Spike.

He can't say _thank you_ \- that's simply asking too much of a man - but Angel takes Spike's arm and slowly curls it so the pale, vulnerable inside of the wrist is visible. He can smell the blood this close, not warm and alive but familiar all the same, and even better for it. Closing his eyes, he lowers his fangs and bites into Spike's wrist.

The first few drops hit his tongue like water to a man in the desert, and he holds himself back from gulping too much too quickly. He can feel the itch and ache of the bones in his leg knitting together as he drinks. He keeps his eyes closed, the better to focus on the flavor and richness of the blood, the softness of the skin under his lips, the sound of Spike's infrequent breaths.

He suckles more slowly from the wound, drawing it out, extending the pleasure. He suddenly realizes that his fingers have been kneading Spike's arm, almost a caress. He almost stops himself, but then he hears Spike humming under his breath. It almost sounds like a lullaby.

The moment will be broken soon enough, and neither of them will mention this little interlude again. But until then, Angel clears his mind, and drinks, and lets himself heal.

 


End file.
